Home owners will have to pay for equipment used to connect to the national broadband network under moves aimed at cutting costs for the company rolling out the massive ­infrastructure project.

NBN Co does not charge for installing equipment in homes as part of ­network construction, though some internet service providers, including
Telstra
, charge an activation fee for new customers.

However, under a proposal circulated to the telecommunications industry and obtained by The Australian Financial Review, NBN Co said it would no longer be responsible for installing and maintaining equipment needed to connect to the internet over the NBN.

Instead, ISPs such as Telstra and
iiNet
would need to supply their own modems, which could be installed by home owners, or by a professional.

NBN Co said it may carry out these installations for a fee.

Most providers charge between $150 and $250 to connect new users to copper-based ADSL2 broadband services, a practice that would likely continue under NBN Co’s proposal.

NBN Co warned against users installing their own equipment, telling industry that the fibre-to-the-node network it is planning to roll out is particularly sensitive to mistakes in installation, and would most likely require a professional electrician to install the modem and any other required equipment.

The company would also stop offering back-up batteries to homes. The Labor government had mandated that NBN Co provide batteries to all NBN users. The batteries are needed to keep some voice and medical services running in a power outage. Under the proposal, which could save millions of dollars for the company, responsibility for the batteries would be given to ISPs.

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“A standard connection to the NBN remains free. But we would consider setting up a professional paid for ­installation field force for additional in-home wiring if [ISPs] wanted it . . . we are ­seeking their views," an NBN Co spokesman said.

“You will see a tighter focus on ­efficiency and delivery. This is somebody else’s money and I look at it that way, therefore we need to treat it with a degree of frugality," he told the Financial Review last month.

“I have a long list of operational reviews that I’m going to go through the company [with] that will take a number of weeks to get through and I may conclude there are other areas where we can be more efficient . . . by doing stuff out of the box."

It is also facing increased competition for lucrative customers from the likes of
TPG
, which has been rolling out a competing network at apartment buildings in metropolitan areas.

But the company has been watering down the guarantees it can offer customers over the new broadband network as it rolls out fibre-to-the-node technology, which relies on the slower but cheaper copper network.

The company said in the discussion paper it would only guarantee download speeds of up to 25 megabits per second and upload speeds of 1 Mbps, similar to ADSL2 broadband services.

Mr Morrow and other NBN Co ­executives would appear before the Senate committee overseeing construction of the network on Monday.

Though customers would be allowed to purchase higher speed tiers of “up to 50 Mbps" or “up to 100 Mbps", the company said it may not tell customers whether their connection would actually be capable of reaching those speeds.

“Selecting the correct speed tier will be the responsibility of the end user and the provider," it said. “For example, NBN Co does not intend to prevent end users and/or providers from ordering the up to 100 Mbps speed tier for a service that would typically experience speeds of less than 50 Mbps."